Vorpal Blade

by John Ringo

  "Sir," Gunny Frandsen said. "We're getting low on privates. Why don't I take point?"

  "Lead on, Gunny," the CO said. "Everyone stay off the radio as much as possible. It's liable to attract these things."

  Frandsen dropped into the hole, followed by Berg, Hattelstad and Jaenisch. They stayed on their boards since the drop was over thirty meters.

  "Keep your eyes and ears open," the gunny growled, looking around. There were several tunnels branching off from the hole, but only two big enough for one of the beetles. One was headed towards the city so . . .

  "Heading left," Gunny Frandsen said.

  The tunnel bent almost immediately, then dropped sharply downward. Gunny Frandsen slid down the slope carefully and negotiated another bend as it bottomed out. The tunnel twisted like it had been made by a snake. Just around the corner the gunny stopped at the sight of one of the smaller Demons. It was lying on the ground, its head propped on crossed forearms, and appeared to be asleep.

  The gunny reached down and pulled out a bush-axe. He'd carried one ever since he was a teenager doing survey work in the arctic.

  Sneaking was not impossible in a Wyvern when the floor was reasonably flat. And this one had, clearly, been flattened by the feet of quite a few Demons. It was even easier on the boards.

  The gunny silently slid forward until he was looming over the Demon, then slashed downward, severing its spine.

  He levered the big axe out, wiped it on the Demon, tracked right and left with his Gatling then waved the team forward.

  * * *

  "Sir, the hull is overheating," the XO said. "We're up to a thousand degrees on the rear edges."

  "And they are gaining on us," the CO pointed out. "We'll chill as soon as we can. Right now, we're fighting for our lives."

  As the ship left the atmosphere, it could speed up. But, apparently, so could the dragonflies. Their wings had retracted and now projected as thin canards, tilted up and down and glowing faintly blue. And the laser fire hadn't reduced. The sonar-dome was melted through and the forward torpedo room had had to be evacuated, the torps jettisoned before they exploded.

  "What's the atmosphere outside like?" the CO asked.

  "Less than one tenth of a percent, sir," Lieutenant Souza answered. "We should be able to survive a short-ranged hit."

  The problem was that the dragonflies had closed to within fifty klicks. The ship probably could survive an ardune strike that close, but they'd taken enough damage.

  "Fire ardune torp into the center of their formation," the CO said. "Evasion course Charlie."

  "We'll have to turn," Lieutenant Souza said. "Otherwise the torp's liable to slam into us."

  "Pilot, prepare for skew turn," the CO said. "Rear torpedoes ready?"

  "Ardune torp up on four," Lieutenant Souza replied.

  "Prepare to fire on four," the CO said. "Pilot, skew turn!"

  The ship pivoted in space, continuing in the same direction but briefly presenting its rear to the oncoming dragonflies.

  "Fire!" the CO shouted as the torpedo came to bear.

  The skew had thrown off the fire of the dragonflies so the torpedo made it out of the tubes and, following its programming, went "up" from the ship and then forward towards the enemy.

  "Fire lasers when they bear!" the CO said.

  The laser to laser battle began again. By bearing on just one of the dragonflies with both lasers they'd found they could burn through its shields after a few minutes of continuous fire. Doing that, they'd dropped a few. But there were over fifty in the swarm and while their lasers were not particularly powerful, they concentrated, too.

  "Forward torpedo room breached!" the XO said.

  "Good thing we launched all the torps," the CO said. "Or we'd be in a right pickle about now."

  At that moment the torpedo dropped into the midst of the enemy formation and detonated in a flash that shut down all the visual systems.

  "All right!" Spectre shouted. "Eat quarkium you dragonfly bastards!"

  "Wait," the XO said, then let out a sigh. The area of effect of the warhead had been enough. Nuclear weapons don't propagate in space the same way that they do in atmosphere. In atmosphere, besides the immediate blast area effect there are various effects from atmosphere. The blast gets propagated by compression waves, destroying far beyond the "totally destroyed" area of the actual blast.

  In space, there was no way to do damage much beyond where the blast spread. But in this case, the dragonfly formation had been entirely in the blast zone. None of the dragonflies came out the other side.

  "Tactical, what do you have on the scope?" the CO asked.

  "We had to shut the radars down, sir," Lieutenant Souza said. "Otherwise we would have lost them to EMP. We're coming back up, now."

  "I don't see anything," the XO said, looking at the visual scope. It had only shut down temporarily, to prevent "blinding" the CCD camera.

  "Come on, Tactical," Spectre said impatiently.

  "Coming up now, sir," Lieutenant Souza said. "Stand by . . ."

  "Nothing there," the NCOIC said. "Spread the scan."

  "Opening up on spread scan," the tech said, then gulped.

  "Oh, maulk," the NCOIC said.

  "Conn, Tactical."

  "Go."

  "We have five . . . six . . . increasing groups of bandits approaching. They're coming from all over the world, sir."

  "How far?" Spectre asked.

  "Nearest is about two hundred klicks, sir, approaching from zero-one-eight mark minus five."

  "Pilot," Spectre said. "Get this tub out to warp point. Then punch it for 60 AU from the sun. We've got to chill."

  "Aye, aye, sir," the pilot said, backing away from the planet.

  "The Marines are on their own," the CO said, shrugging. "Let's hope they can figure out a way for us to come back. If not, we'll be back some day."

  "Yes, sir," the XO said.

  "Damn this planet."

  "Conn, Tactical."

  "Go."

  "I've been doing some computations, sir," Lieutenant Souza said. "We're deep inside the grav well of this Jovian. I don't think we're going to reach warp before we're swarmed."

  "Lieutenant, you've got two torp tubes and four SM-9s at your disposal," the CO said. "Do something about that."

  34

  Beachhead

  Berg passed four kills for Gunny Frandsen before the latter's luck ran out.

  The tunnel had descended deep into the earth, the walls changing from stabilized earth to limestone, then back upwards. As they abruptly changed to granite and he negotiated another of the snaking turns, Frandsen stopped and then started to backpedal.

  "Dra—" he shouted over the team net. Then a head snaked around the corner and snatched the armor off the board. With a crunch that echoed through the tunnel, the gunny's armor crumpled like a beer can under a foot and splashed bright red.

  The head of the dragon was twice the size of a suit of armor and armored itself with heavy overlapping plates. The head was bright red, shading backwards through purple to a blue body with red highlights on shoulders and hips.

  That was about all that Berg noticed as he opened fire with his Gatlings. But as he had halfway come to expect, the rounds bounced off the bullet head of the thing, which slithered forward fast and low, snatching Sergeant Jaenisch off his board and crunching again.

  "JAEN!" Berg shouted, his hands dropping to his hips. "Hatt! Back, back!"

  "Grapp you!" Hatt shouted, backing slowly as he pumped grenades at the thing. The explosions were damaging some of the plates on the thing's head, but they weren't penetrating. Whether Hatt was cursing Berg's suggestion or the dragon wasn't clear since he was the next to go. The dragon snapped him off the board then hammered him back and forth on the granite walls.

  Berg fired three of the .50 caliber rounds in various spots, juncture of the neck and shoulder, throat, leg. All three sparked off the refractory armor of the beast.

  Then it was his turn as the
beast charged down the granite tunnel. Its maw opened and for a moment all he saw was teeth and tonsils. Then he opened fire with all three guns.

  The thing was fast. It was on him before he could trigger more than two rounds from each pistol, but he was biting down on his fire clamp at the same time and looking right down the thing's throat.

  The 7.62 mm rounds chewed into the back of the beast's mouth, ripping the soft flesh but not stopping it; the thick bone on that portion of the head caused them to do no more than embed in flesh. It was hurt but nothing the Gatling could do was going to kill it.

  The .50 caliber rounds, however, punched through the bone. One buried itself in still more bone in the thick skull of the beast. Another ricocheted down and out, punching a hole in the bottom of the monster's mouth. The third ricocheted down its throat, lodging deep in the neck of the beast in a spot that would, eventually, kill it.

  The fourth, however, punched through a thick ridge of bone, then struck the beast's backbone, cracking a vertebra and severing its spinal cord.

  The dragon dropped ten feet from Berg, its mouth still thrashing open and closed and its body thrashing. But it had no voluntary control over its limbs, which rattled in convulsions, shaking the refractory walls of the tunnel and causing rocks to drop from the ceiling.

  "Grapp me," Berg muttered, sliding forward on his board and emptying his pistols into the thing's head. He stayed up near the ceiling, avoiding the clashing teeth, until it finally gave a shudder and died.

  "We're blown," Captain MacDonald said. "Move up the pace. Alpha Team, point."

  "Grapp, grapp, grapp," Berg muttered, reloading.

  "Are you sure it's dead?" PFC Wangen asked as he flew past. As he said it, the thing convulsed again, shaking down more rock.

  "It's as dead as I can make it," Two-Gun said, jacking a round into the chamber of the converted rifle.

  "Two-Gun," Top said. "Close up behind Bravo Team."

  "Aye-aye, Top," Berg said tiredly. He didn't look at the bodies of Hatt and Jaen as he passed. The Marines made a big thing of leaving no wounded or dead behind. But there were times when it just wasn't feasible to try. Maybe, if any of them survived, they could pick up Hatt and Jaen. If they could get the armor cut off.

  If any of them survived this grapping madhouse.

  "Contact!" Staff Sergeant Sutherland shouted.

  "We're up to nineteen contacts," the Tac NCOIC said.

  "Fine," Lieutenant Souza said, tapping at his computer.

  "Closure rate is forty kkps on the nearest. Ten minutes until we are in range of their lasers."

  "I can see that," Lieutenant Souza said. "Just keep an eye out for new tracks. I'll send over the fire spread as soon as I'm done with it."

  "Yes, sir," the chief petty officer said.

  The smaller Demons fell in windrows to the fire of the Gatlings as the Marines pressed forward. Alpha Team had formed a stack with the two Gatling gunners low and the grenadier high. Any of the Demons who survived their assault were being picked off by Bravo.

  But there was one problem.

  "I'm clocking out!" Wangen screamed.

  "Bravo, move forward," Lieutenant Berisford said. "Alpha, prepare to pass Bravo forward."

  "Aye, aye, sir," Sutherland said. "Wanker, split right and lift . . ."

  The two lower boards separated and lifted, maintaining fire, as Bravo Team came in low and under them and took over fire.

  "Sir, there's light up ahead," Staff Sergeant Sutherland reported. "And increased particle emissions, mostly mesons."

  "Roger," Lieutenant West said. The platoon leader was just about the last officer left in the company except for the CO. "Commander Weaver? We've got meson emissions ahead."

  "Could mean anything," Weaver said. "Let's see what's up there."

  "Demons are discontinuing assault, moving forward," Staff Sergeant Sutherland said, then gasped. "Sir . . . I'm not sure how to evaluate this."

  "This is my suggestion on spread, sir," Lieutenant Souza said, shooting the plan over to the CO's station. "It should take out the closest seven groups. But after that, we're out of ammo. And the trailing four, unless one closes on the bursts, are going to catch us short of warp point."

  "Best we can do, Lieutenant," the CO said calmly. "We'll try to hold them off with the lasers until we can escape."

  "Yes, sir," Souza said, knowing full well that was pissing in the wind.

  "You have control over missile weapons systems," the CO said, reaching over and inserting his key. One turn was all it took to open up the long-range missiles.

  "Very well, sir," Souza said. "Load all torpedo tubes. . . ."

  The cavern was high and round, looking very much like a natural bubble in the rock. It also appeared to be a dead-end. And its contents were anything but natural.

  "Is that Dreen fungus?" Weaver asked, looking at the round patch of mossy substance that seemed to be rippling as if from some unseen wind. It was located on the east wall of the chamber, about twenty feet across and flanked by strange protuberances that looked something like fungi.

  "Wrong color," Chief Miller said, flicking on his white-light flash. The chief had outfitted himself not only with a Gatling, but with one of the remaining .50 caliber rifles. "I think it's got to be some sort of door. All the Demons we passed couldn't have come out of this chamber."

  "Yeah," Weaver said. "But how do we open it?"

  "Why open it?" Miller asked. "Set the damned munitions here and blow the chamber. That should stop the Demons."

  "I know how to open it," Miriam said, sliding forward on her board. "And we need to."

  "Why?" Miller asked.

  "Because we have to know where the door goes," Miriam said cryptically, then squeaked on the external speakers.

  Lady Che-chee slid forward on her own board and looked at the strange material. She squeaked at Miriam, who gestured forward.

  Lifting slightly, the Lady flew over the Marines deployed in front of the moss and hovered between two of the protuberances, right at arm's length. She took off her gauntlets and, reaching out, placed one palm on each of the fungi.

  The moss began rippling harder, then drew back, revealing . . .

  "It's a grapping gate," Miller whispered. "Grapp me."

  . . . a Looking Glass.

  "So we pop the damned bomb through the gate then get the hell out," Miller said. "That gives us two weeks to get something better done." The ardune weapon would destabilize the gate for at least that long.

  "The ship was under attack by aerial forces," Weaver said. "They didn't come from this facility. This is just a gateway to the local area. What's through there is the link to other areas, most likely."

  "Then we toss both bombs through the gate," Miller said. "Full yield. Since it's not local, I don't give a maulk what it destroys."

  "No," Weaver said, looking at the gate. "We need to find out where the Demons are coming from. You don't get it. The Cheerick was the key to opening the gate."

  "How do we know?" Miller asked. "We didn't have one of the Marines try."

  "Because Cheerick arms are shorter," Miriam said. "The distance is right for a Cheerick Mother. This facility, these Demons, they have something to do with the Cheerick."

  "Look," Miller said. "You're the boss. We're going to go wherever you say. But I guarantee the other side of that gate is a world of hurt."

  "It might also be the key to saving the ship," Weaver said. "And this world. Captain MacDonald."

  "Done with your council, sir?" the Marine asked.

  "We're going through the gate," Weaver said. "Send one man through. Have him report back if the immediate other side is survivable . . ."

  "Two-Gun."

  "Yes, Top?" Berg said, both pistols and his Gatling pointed at the Looking Glass.

  "You get the honor of finding out what is on the other side of that gate," the first sergeant said. "Your job is to enter, determine immediate threat level, then open up a beachhead for follow-on. Do you unders
tand your mission?"

  "Clear, Top," Berg said.

  "Stand by . . . Aye, aye. Two-Gun. Take that beach."

  "Oorah!" Berg shouted, hefting both pistols and charging the gate at a run. "SEMPER FI!"

  35